Appointing Sinhala staff to Tamil schools must stop-CTTU

[TamilNet, Friday, 02 May 2003, 03:05 GMT]The Ceylon Tamil Teachers Union (CTTU) Thursday appealed to the government not to post Sinhala principals, teachers and non-academic staff to Tamil medium schools outside the northeast province. A resolution to this effect was adopted at the May Day meeting held Thursday in Trincomalee by the CTTU, sources said.

The Ministry of Education is now in the process of posting Sinhala principals, teachers and even non-academic staff to Tamil medium schools in other provinces excluding northeast. The CTTU views this development as an act of converting Tamil medium schools as Sinhala schools in the long run, CTTU general secretary Mr.T.Mahasivam said.

CTTU President Mr.S.Thandauthapani presided.

The other resolutions adopted at the CTTU May Day meeting are:

The government should take immediate steps to provide teachers monthly salary of minimum ten thousand rupees.

The present government promised five thousand rupees salary increase for public servants before during election time. The government should take immediate steps to fulfill this promise without fail.

The government should take steps to implement decisions arrived at peace talks without delay enabling the LTTE to resume peace negotiation to find a political
solution on the basis of federal concept with internal self-determination.

Even after giving permanent appointment to volunteer teachers and to GCE A/L/qualified youths more than five thousand vacancies exist for Tamil medium teachers in the country. The government should take prompt steps to fill these vacancies.

The Ministry of education should take steps to provide automatic promotion to teachers on point basis without further delay as teachers have been deprived of their routine promotion for the last two and a half years.